mail it in

v. phr. to perform in a cursory or sub-standard manner. Subjects: English, Sports & Recreation, Slang

Editorial Note: A synonym is to phone it in, which is more common in non-sports entertainment. Mail it in is different from mail in the stats, used as an expression of confidence that a team will win, as in, “You can mail in the stats because the championship is a lock.”

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Citations: 1986 Gary Binford Newsday (Long Island, N.Y.) (Feb. 21) “For Knicks, Eight Is Not Enough” p. 159: Don’t think you’re going to mail it in and don’t come in with your head down. We’re going to try to win the game. 1990 David Aldridge Washington Post (Dec. 4) “Malones and Stockton Too Jazzy for Bullets” p. E1: They jumped on us and never got off.…We could have just mailed it in tonight. We didn’t have the intensity we had at home and we never got into it. 2003 Delia Salvi Friendly Enemies (Jan. 1) p. 21: Actors often go through the motions, mouthing the dialogue in a natural way and simply following the blocking.…This kind of acting is often referred to as “mailing it in” or “walking through it.” 2004 Andy Kessler Wall Street Meat (Jan. 1) p. 100: It didn’t take long to figure out that she was mailing it in, and hadn’t lifted a finger to do research for quite some time. 2004 John Lindley Handicapping for Bettor Or Worse (Apr. 25) p. 156: Experienced horses may cheat or protect themselves during a race (in human sports vernacular they are “mailing it in”). 2004 David Gardner, Tom Gardner The Motley Fool’s Money After 40 (May 25) p. 51: This 8.75 percent return, far preferable to “mailing it in” with a basic savings or CD interest rate, isn’t achieved risk- or heartache-free. 2006 Barry Blake Times-Standard (Eureka, California) (Jan. 12) “Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of bulk mail”: We have Bayside, where alert and caring clerks deliver honest, knowledgeable, efficient, thorough service with good humor, instead of “just mailing it in,” as they say in sports.

Posted 13 Jan 06 | Permalink | Tell a Friend